Christmas wishes

Here is picture of us after the play! :) I hope you all take the time to remember the sacrifice of the Savior for you in this time. He gave us the greatest gift of all, more wonderful than any other, and that is the Atonement. :) If you don´t fully understand how great of a gift it is, then let your gift to the Savior be learning and applying His gift to us in our lives. He wants us to come to Him and use his gift! Christmas is the best!! :)

Christmas wishes (1)

So here is a bit about my week, Elder Corrales and I participated in a stake activity in our ward, Pirai, we did a little theater/play. It was about the birth of Christ. There was a grandma talking to her grandkids about the importance of the Savior in their lives. So there was a scene of a millionaire and his wife, an artista (movie star or other famous people) and a Politico (politician) I was the artista, E.C. was the Politico :D I had some cool shades and my hair was done up and i had jeans and t shirt, (and my plaque of course :D) So all these people were entering a hotel, and the desk person kept commenting on how important these people were, then the next scene was of us three all searching for someone. Someone way more important than us. Then the next was us worshipping the newborn Jesus. and it was just about how even all these super important people even worshipped the Savior. That He was far more important. Then we ended with Away in a Manger, I sang one verse solo, and it was super fun :) we found out after it was a competition, and that our ward got 1st place! We left early because our 9 o'clock bedtime :D ´There were a total of 8 wards too. Haha also a miracle because we only practiced like one time and hour and a half before :D It was super great. Every day here is better. :)

 

And in response to an email I sent:

I actually sang a song here too! La Primera Navidad with Elder Corrales and the Hermanas in our zone. It was really good. We sang it for our Christmas conference as missionaries and also for our ward (we have a trio of sisters in our ward).

 

And here is a picture of Elder Corrales and I, and the Hermanas that sang La Primera Navidad with us. Hermana Johns, Segovia and Huaman. They are the ones in our ward. But in the other district. Tons of fun :)

12-2013 pictures

12-16-13

Here is as string of emails from Josh this morning, along with a great
bunch of pictures showing where he lives (pictures aren't posting, so I'll try to post them later )!

So this week there isnt too much to talk about I don´t think.. all of
our original dates for baptisms fell through. But apparently that
happens all the time here. This particular area is really rough. Elder
Corrales has only had 2 baptisms in the 4 months he has been here. In
his other area he had 10. The ward doesnt really help us here, and
haha it is barely functioning by itself. So we´re having to spend most
of our time working with members of the ward and the inactive members.
Did I tell you that I started a class for english?? I had 9 people
come yesterday! It was way fun. And half of those nine were inactive
members! :) How is everything going for you all there??

I havent heard from any friends except from Walker one time. I did
know that sam was doing that :) Not the clogging, but the guitar.
Thats super cool. We have to clean our house, but its not hard because
it is tiny :D No i like food too much to only eat once :D haha i find
a way usually. People will just feed us, or ill get some bread. Its
super cheap anyway. And yes ive definitly lost weight :D My pants are
all loose hahaha not sure how much though. but im also working out
every morning and that helps.

Here are some more of our house. And yes, the walls are just blankets
:D in the front at least :D when I first saw it I was like, what in
the world am I doing here :D Thats it, im going home. haha but its all
good now :) the blankets are in front, then there is a small hallway
with our room and bathroom. Super tiny. we are living above the
apartment of a member family. But no everything here is gated. Like
with big locks and everything. So not much of a problem. Yeah no air
conditioning, so on the nights that it is really hot, it is rough. I
just sleep on top of my blankets and am fine. I do sit ups and push
ups in the mornings. I really focus on sit ups right now though. Its
pretty great.

Elder corrales is from Santiago, Chile. haha :D all my companions so
far that ahve been latino have been chileans :D

Who told you wealthy? But yes, a part is. There are mansions and huge
gates. They are gorgeous. But we dont go there. Ever. We stick to the
regular people :D We walk. And walk. And walk. Buses for far away
places, and seldom taxis. The people here are so warm and inviting.
All super nice. :) And I told you the challenge. The ward isnt
functional :) haha but we are working on it!

street pics and the front of our house. We live in the back though so
you cant see it.

The people here are all very humble. Not much money. For example, i
bought a really nice pair of jeans for 10 bucks in american dollars.
All my groceries for the week cost like 70 bolivianos, which is about
10 dollars. :D

No that is the familia Rojo. They are awesome :) I´ll get a pic this
week for you. Its nice because we have paved streets for sure :D
everywhere else is just tons of sand :D yeaaaaah our part of the house
isnt nice. ive been to two other missionaries homes and ours is the
most sketch by far :D Alrighy my time is up so love you all! :) Have
a wonderful week.

11/9/13

Hey everyone! How's it going! I cant believe how fast Christmas is coming right now. It is also really weird to be in the Christmas season and have it be so hot. like it is killer. As for the news of the week there isn't really too much. Elder Corrales had to go back to the clinic a whole bunch of times for extra treatments and we had a couple really long meetings. It was mostly just slow. And on the days we were working, not a single person hardly was home so we had very little success :D One interesting thing, President Willard has announced that for our mission, knocking on doors is no longer allowed. We have to meet more with members, active and non, get references, and current investigators, oh and street contacts. So this will be interesting. Oh yeah! I started a class on Sundays teaching English to encourage investigators to come to church. It was actually a lot of fun :D This Sunday though, there was seriously on like a third of the ward there :D So missionaries have only been in Bolivia for 50 years, so the oldest members here remember the very first missionaries ever here. How wild is that :D The mission is kinda in a slump right now though. There aren´t many areas having a lot of success. But its all good! Hope you all have a great week! :).

Happy Thanksgiving (12/2/13)

Hey Happy Thanksgiving!! :) Tell me all about it! I remembered, and celebrated it with Elder Corrales by going out for some chicken! It was fun. It is soooooooo hot here. Like about 105 everyday. I've never sweat so much in my life. Its good though. The days are really long, but the weeks are pretty short. I dont have a ton of time today, so I promise pictures are coming next week! The reason for that is kinda scary, right after we returned to our apartment last night, all of a sudden E Corrales had tons of pain in his stomach. Like insane amounts. We ended up having to go to a clinic. As I walked him out to the taxi, he started to lose the feeling in his arms, and be really dizzy, I now know it was because he was hyperventilating, so I'll know how to help next time. They did a whole bunch of tests on him, we had to stay the night there, I was up until around 3. It was a long and miserable night. Mostly because I had no idea what in the world was going on :D He ended up having kidney stones, probably because every family in the whole world gives us soda when we visit. So he needs to drink more water in the future.

The work is going great though! We have three investigators with baptismal dates, and tons of wonderful investigators. The family who feeds us everyday for lunch is the best :) So all is well here. What's been happening there?? Funny side note, for Sacrament yesterday, they had two primary aged girls bring violins, and they played the music with those instead of the piano. Hahah is was soooo slow :D